Senator Byron Dorgan did a great job standing up for American workers

However, three fundamental aspects of the bill are of serious concern.

1.No one prospers in a free market that is so flooded with low cost competition for the goods or services they offer that prices plummet to the level of the lowest cost competitor in the world. ... However, rather than merely accommodating the current state of affairs, the bill actually contains incentives for employers to churn their labor forces in ways that will likely stimulate far wider immigration, both legal and illegal. This flood of new workers is likely to swamp the free-market advantages workers gain through legalization and portability.

2.While the ideal is for new workers to have the freedom to make choices about their work, this freedom is illusory. The structure of the future flow immigration program under McCain/Kennedy ends up, in some ways, with the worst of both worlds. Because of what they must do to become and remain legally authorized, workers will find themselves without the practical ability to exercise choices in the free market, but also without the protections of more traditional temporary worker programs.

3.Finally, the labor protections that are included in the bill cannot actually be enforced under proposed mechanisms.

These factors are likely to conspire to cause churning of workers in non-professional occupations, with very little job security and too many workers chasing too few jobs. Traditionally, temporary labor programs have attempted to protect the wages and working conditions in the U.S. economy not only by limiting the numbers of new workers, but by mandating minimum conditions of employment that meet or exceed those conditions prevailing in the industry and area of employment.

Both serve to help protect the wages of all workers from being adversely affected by use of temporary workers from other countries.) There is only the requirement that the H-5A worker be paid the same as others similarly situated. There is nothing, aside from the economic counter pressure of workers’ demands, to keep wages from drifting steadily downward to the minimum wage. The lack of a prevailing wage standard will encourage recruitment of new workers at the lowest level and will drive down wages. Protections against wage discrimination between workers will only encourage employers to discharge or fail to rehire current staff in order to reduce wages for everyone.

The undersigned authors of this analysis bring the unique prospective of a collective 136years of legal experience representing immigrant workers, mostly in migrant legal services projects. A significant aspect of this work has involved litigation and advocacy with respect to the H-2A and H-2B temporary worker programs. Experience with these programs, and with the implementation of the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1984, offers significant insight into how the H-5A and H-5B programs proposed in the McCain/ Kennedy bill might actually work in the real world.

** This analysis of the labor provisions of that bill was prepared to share those perspectives with labor, immigrant advocacy organizations and other allies in the comprehensive immigration reform movement.**